Hi all, I thought I'd check with the experts here about an issue I've been facing with my ISP and I want to know if I'm being given the runaround by the OR Engineer I've been dealing with.
I'm on a VDSL2 line, which I've been on for several years with the same ISP (EE). Absolutely no issues, I usually get around 67-72Mbps down and around 13-18Mbps up.
A few months around, there was some major road resurfacing work going on on the main roads, right outside my street. This was happening on sundays. During that time my connection speed would gradually get slower and drop constantly. From around Monday-Wednesday it would do this before righting itself towards the end of the week. Roll onto sunday again and rinse and repeat.
During an issue/period of instability, I reported this to EE via the SMS bot, which figured out there was a problem and organised for an engineer to visit.
Now, the engineer that came is a nice lad and very personable. He arrived and checked some things out with a PDA he had and said that there was a potential bridge tap and briefly explained what one is. He complained about the sockets in the house (they weren't BT, put in by contractors) and explained how they often naff up the internal wiring and this can cause issues.
I think nothing of this and accept his explanation. I didn't want to move the router into the hallway, which was his suggestion, to connect it to the master socket, so instead he re-wired the sockets such that the socket I was using is now the master socket and no other socket in the house works. He also changed the socket to one that includes the filter inside the box, so I only need to use an RJ-11 cable to my modem router.
Now, at this point, it's probably a thursday or friday. My connection issues were subsiding. I'd been reading about OpenReach's DLMs and what they do. I guessed that I'd been put onto a DLM band lower than normal due to the issues. Confident that his socket change and re-wiring had done the job, and as I was asking about the DLM, he offered to perform a DLM reset. I eagerly said yes, he did the reset and I was put into the 40-80 band (by the looks of it).
Everything was pretty good for about a month when speeds started to suffer again. The roadworks were over and done with, thankfully. I reported the fault, same engineer comes to my house. At the door, we chatted and he suggested a DLM reset again (or, maybe I did, I don't know). He happily reset and went on his way.
Another month rolls by, speeds start to suffer again.
I haven't mentioned my kit, yet, so, at this point I was using an Asus DSL-AC88U modem/router. It's been fine for years and years. I also have a pair of Asus ZenWifi XT8 Mesh routers. They were in AP mode and the DSL-AC88U was acting as the modem. Prior to the issues starting up, I'd used this kit for years without an issue. I've always used a custom/third-party router as I do a bit of networking and have a home NAS, etc and prefer the flexibility.
So, the problems are back. I've been trying to use my DSL-AC88U with my android phone to tether as a backup/failover WAN. It wasn't working. I decided to throw the towel in with the DSL modem and buy a Draytek Vigor 167 Bridge Modem and use the ZenWifi Mesh as the router
Set up the new kit, seems to work well enough but my problems persist. I also have weird packet loss, which I don't end up figuring out for a couple of days. This was due to connecting the Dreytek up to an unmanaged switch to access the Web UI page. This caused some weird loop on my network and made me suffer packet loss.
I report the problem again, engineer is assigned again, it's the same guy, again. This time he changed his tune entirely. Told me he can't keep doing DLM resets, which is fair enough, that he'll get a bollocking as the DLM cards will burn out and then starts blaming the equipment I've got at home and saying it's causing a bridge tap. He showed me the GEA report that shows this. That if he comes out and finds that it's my equipment, he might have to charge me.
This sent me of a path of researching a bridge tap and what it is and how it happens.I don't see how a bridge tap can suddenly form in my internal house wiring, or how "some kit you've plugged in" can cause it when I've connected a well known and respectable brand of modem and that's it.
My current connection speeds are 30Mbps down and 13MBps up and have been locked at this for about 6 weeks now, which should have been enough time for the DLM to move profiles or do something.
Now, sorry for the long post. TL;DR?
Am I being given the runaround? How is it possible that, despite changing nothing in the internal wiring in my house, that I can suddenly develop a bridge tap? Is it even possible for something I plug into my router to cause a bridge tap at home?
I want to report the problem again because at the current speeds are way below the guaranteed minimum and literally half of what I'm paying. I feel like the changes I've made at home have all been in response to having issues and none of them can have contributed to the issue. I feel like the issue is outside my house, but I don't know what to do if the engineer comes and plugs into the master socket and shows the clean/non-impacted speeds?
Help!
edit:
I've added some screenshots from the Dreytek WebUI page. Even the max attainable rate has dropped. The max attainable rate used to be pretty much 79999 and 19999, and actual link speeds being around 74000 and 18000 (give or take)
